


The World Is Not Beautiful

by ThereWillBeCubes



Category: Pocket Monsters: X & Y | Pokemon X & Y Versions, Pokemon
Genre: Gen, Implied Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-01
Updated: 2014-10-01
Packaged: 2018-02-19 11:43:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2387090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThereWillBeCubes/pseuds/ThereWillBeCubes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lysandre succeeds, but he quickly realises what his new world truly is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The World Is Not Beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> A/N:
> 
> I played Pokemon X, and really enjoyed it, but couldn't imagine a viable world if Lysandre actually succeeded. Sycamore was a little oblivious, but I think that could've been influenced by his feelings, so a bit of implication there for me.

I had never seen death before. As the weapon hit, I watched Serena’s eyes turn from enraged to glassy, before falling on the steps, her glasses skittering off her hat. The sound “Pilot” escaped her lips as she fell, and her Delphox gave one last scream of grief and pain as it fell to embrace her, before it too died, its fur losing all definition and turning grey.

I felt a strange pang at obvious bond between trainer and pokemon, but I was too overtaken by the heady rush of victory. It had worked. I had survived. She had not, and the so-called legendary pokemon that had sought her help died with her, powering the means of its own destruction. Her other two friends, the other children that Sycamore had chosen, had collapsed at the top of the hall, dying with desperation in their screams.

They… were only children. One of the grunts had screamed in response, in horror as the youngest one, the brown-haired 10 year old, had crumpled to the floor.

A mighty crack resonated, and I felt the ground begin to shake. Letting my heady adrenalin carry me effortlessly up the stairs, I entered the main hall to screams and a push for the exit. Aliana sprinted up to me.

“The weapon, it’s collapsing, sir!” she said, breathlessly, her voice cracking.

“What?!” I replied, but I could see it now, the bulk of the flower had started to sink into the ground, the entire HQ quaking with the force.

“We have to get out of here, sir,” Aliana said, and with surprising strength and unusual confidence, grabbed my sleeve and pulled in the direction of the admin elevator. The others were already waiting there, well, almost all of them.

“Bryony! Where’s Bryony?” Celosia was saying, trying to leave, but Mable held her back.

“She’s probably with the other grunts,” she said sharply, “we can’t see her here, and she wasn’t in any other chambers. She’ll be fine.”

Celosia fidgeted, but stayed put. She perked up a little seeing myself and Aliana enter the elevator.

“Oh! You’re alright!” she said, her voice tight, restraining herself, most likely, from asking about Bryony.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I said, a little more sharply than I intended. The elevator went quiet and Aliana coughed.

“Well, we thought the legendary pokemon or weapon might’ve harmed you, you were in such close proximity to the power surge.”

“Well, I’m fine.”

No-one said anything else as the steel doors slid shut, and we left the bodies to be crushed.

 

o-o-o

 

There was a lot more mayhem then I had anticipated. The collapse of the weapon had been hypothesised and the emergency exit measures put in place. But many members of Team Flare had not been prepared for the true meaning of the new world. As the admins, scientists, and I, stepped out into the open air, the smell of smoke and blood thickened the breeze. Grunts that had been standing guard at the stone cemetery site were now standing around in abject awe, while the less emotionally prepared were crying, curled up in balls, some even vomiting in shock and horror at the new world.

Withered pokemon littered the ground, birds fallen from the sky, small grey bugs, dogs and cats, all having tried to escape the blast. Trainers weren’t far behind, some slumped in doorways, others face down in the dirt. Most of the team flare members seemed unsure what to do with them, and in many cases, entirely unwilling to go near them.

Some bodies had split open due to the force of the blast, and their internal organs had already spread out on the plain, I turned my face away from them.

“What now?” Aliana asked, “to Lumiose?”

What now? Did I want to go back there, where the stench of death would be in every alley and high-rise? Here was a small village, the grisly sights would only be compounded in the densely-populated heart of Kalos.

_Formerly densely-populated._

For a moment, I felt my confidence waver. What were we to do now? Half the grunts could barely take the sight of a few bodies, and the other half seemed dumbfounded that the plan had actually worked as intended. Even a few admins had fallen completely silent, staring at the scattered bodies.

Maybe throwing them in the deep end would shock their senses, allow them to adapt to the worst.

“Yes, we go to Lumiose.”

 

o-o-o

 

I had been correct. We had cars and trucks carrying equipment take almost all of team flare to Lumiose City, leaving a small group of grunts and Aliana behind to clean up Geosenge before following. I had chosen her because she seemed the least effected and most stoic of the scientists, as well as one of the few admins that hadn’t cried or collapsed.

_Isn’t this what we all wanted?_

The rest of us went to the capital.

I had been correct. The silent city did not welcome us with lights or a throng of people. The women manning the gate desks were in piles on the floor, and as we entered the city, the full brunt of what we had done finally hit us.

Prism tower was lightless and dead, and every other light was out. It was mid afternoon, and the soupy orange sun bathed every stone and store-front. Bodies lay everywhere, grey pokemon by their sides. A grunt fainted at the sight of a small child clasping a Litleo, both with their eyes and mouths wide open in horror. People slumped over tables at cafes and restaurants, a Lumi cab had crashed into the window of the hairdressers, glass covering the bloody driver, his passenger thrown from the car, lying lifeless nearby.

We all silently stood for awhile, drinking it in. Slowly, not entirely of my own accord, I began walking down the street, towards the pokemon lab.

“Boss? What do you want us to do?” Xerosic finally asked. I stopped.

“Collect the bodies,” I said flatly, “pile them up, and burn them. Burn them all.”

“Drag all these- these corpses?” Celosia asked nervously. She had been a wreck, despite Bryony appearing safe and sound, she had the fear in her heart, and had realised just what the “sacrifice” had meant.

“All of them. We’ll rest when the streets are empty,” I said, more softly, before leaving them all to begin the cleaning.

Xerosic took over, and I went to find his body.

 

o-o-o

 

The lab was deathly dark and quiet. The lack of equipment hum and bright lighting, coupled with the dark orange pouring through the windows, leant the labs a positively apocalyptic look.

The bodies didn’t help. How many more would I see in my life? What had I done?

I took the stairs; the elevator wasn’t working.

The third floor.

I stepped in, it was empty. Was he even here?

I rounded the divider, and stopped.

He seemed bathed in fire, the angry sunlight throwing his face into deep shadows. I swallowed thickly, and felt my heart start to shudder.

He had been alone in here, pokeballs not even at his sides.

He had died alone.

I let out a strangled noise before pressing my palm to my mouth.

I knew this would happen, I had known this.

I approached the desk, almost afraid. In front of Sycamore were four things; a pen, a holocaster, a letter, and something hidden by the professor’s slumped head.

I stopped, my heart stopped. The letter was addressed to me. He knew I would come here. I wasn’t strong enough to read it, afraid of its contents, instead sliding it into my pocket. I picked up the holocaster, and curiosity made me press “latest message.”

It was Diantha. She looked furious and afraid in equal measure, her voice shaking as she spoke.

“Augustine, please listen, we have to go to Geosenge, we have to stop him. I know your students are strong, but we need to intervene, it is not work for children, Augustine! They are so young… and even they knew Lysandre’s motives better than us! We have to stop him, not just for ourselves… for everyone. Please, I am going to fly to Geosenge, please come, he will listen to you Augustine, he will.”

Diantha had tears in her eyes, but she looked determined.

“It just can’t be too late. Please, pick up Augustine. Come to Geosenge.”

The message was already marked as read.

I took the letter out, and with a nail, opened it. I knew in my heart that scribing this letter was the last thing Augustine Sycamore had ever done, and to not read it would be to disrespect his final actions.

 _“Lysandre,”_ it read,

_“If you’re reading this, it means I am dead, and most likely by your hand. This is deeply saddening to consider, and I personally believe this letter will be stuffed into a desk drawer in a few days, and then found in a spring clean and sheepishly thrown out, but I digress._

_All I can say is the reason I was unable to stop you was genuinely due to the fact I did not believe you could wipe out humankind and pokemonkind alike to achieve an impossible dream. I did not believe my close friend and partner could do such a terrible thing. I did not even believe it was scientifically possible without destroying your own team in the process. Then again, that science was your forte, never mine._

_What else can I say? I am dead, my students are dead, my assistants are dead, the pokemon world is dead._

_We’re gone, Lysandre._

_Is this truly the world you wanted?_

_-Professor Augustine Sycamore.”_

My hands began to shake as they gripped the professor’s last words, then my arms, and before I realised my entire body was shaking. I let go of the letter, it fell silently onto the desk. I gently took Augustine’s face into my hands, his eyes were closed, he looked so… peaceful. But I knew, he would’ve been sitting here. Waiting. Waiting alone for me to kill him. Below his face had been a framed photograph; myself and him in the lab on my last day studying there, his arm around me and that silly grin on his face.

I could hear his voice, calling my name from some distant memory. Only memories now.

I took his arms and torso, and I knelt on the floor of his office, cradling his body, my shoulders shaking, silent tears running down my face.

I was unaware of another presence until I felt a light hand on my shoulder. I tear my face away from his, to meet the stormy eyes of Serena. Her fingers end in blue, razor thin points, digging into my skin. The perforation of flesh with no pain is a curious sensation.

“What do you want?” I croak, my voice hoarse from weeping. My arms have locked into a vice-like grip around Augustine’s corpse, trying to supply it my own warmth, any warmth.

“Come,” Serena said, righting to her full height. She was warped, she was one with life.

The powder blue horns burst from her eyes and head, cut with royal ribbons and gracing her head like a crown. She retained her arms, but her body swept into that of Xerneas, graceful and beautiful. Dormant.

I look down at my only grip on the past.

“No,” I hiss, glaring into her grey eyes. They asked a question.

“They wish for you to come. You will come.”

I couldn’t deal with this, not now, not now.

“Yes now,” Serena’s voice said, powerful and terrible, “I was the bringer of life and I have been sent to fetch the bringer of death. Rise now, and come to Them.”

I watched Augustine’s body slip out of my grip, out of my arms as they begin to burn with painless fire. They elongate and I writhe as I feel talons and horns growing from my hands, head… tail. I began to turn a deep red, and felt fangs grow from my gums and my eyes sharpen.

I stare down at my new form. I am Yveltal, the doom pokemon. For once, life was waiting for me, her eyes deeply disappointed. The lab itself is blurring, and the sun bursts into solar flares as we speed away from the physical world, leaving him behind.

That’s all I was ever going to do.

I had not considered the world beautiful.

Out of the corner of my new eyes, I swear Serena’s mouth tugged.

o-o-o

There was nothing here. We were in black space. Here Serena finally stopped.

“Welcome,” she said simply.

I glanced around. All I could see were faint twinkling stars, dead stars, in the far distance.

“Welcome to where?” I growled. Serena spread her arms.

“The future,” she said, giving me a glance. I honestly didn’t understand.

“The future of your domain,” she clarified, smiling a little.

The space was full of absolutely nothing.

“Where are They?” I asked, weary and quickly tiring of this Serena/Xerneas. Why hadn’t they been stronger? Why hadn’t they stopped me? How could this be the future?

“They have moved on,” Serena/Xerneas said quietly, turning to face me, their delicate legs swimming in nothing.

“Arceus felt their children die at once. They will not create pokemon again. Pokemon bring only the raw pain that comes with unconditional love and devotion. They will try again; they will test humanity on its own. We come for our final act, among the last pokemon, to punish you.”

“How can you possibly punish me?” I asked, feeling the ethereal power of Yveltal flowing through the form, “how is this possibly real? My mind is creating this from grief, I want to be punished, for the terrible things I have done. This is just a product of that desire.”

The human/pokemon was silent, and emerging, as if of the dead starlight themselves, other pokemon began to emerge. Two giant, dragon-like pokemon, one deep blue and the other purple and white, appeared, and hung silently in the dead space.

“Dialga and Palkia, the patrons of time and space,” Serena said solemnly, “will stand to witness.”

I had only ever read depictions of pokemon in old stories and histories, but my mind produced their features with such clarity.

“Oh, get on with it, subconscious, if you’re going to produce something satisfactory, get to the point.”

Serena/Xerneas gave a piercing cry, and I watched the blue explode into gold and the horns swim with colour as they surged with life.

“LYSANDRE,” Xerneas roared in Serena’s voice, many layered with the voices of a thousand dead humans, “WE, XERNEAS, YVELTAL, DIALGA, PALKIA, AND THE CREATOR, FOR TOTAL OBLITERATION OF THE POKEMON WORLD AND ALMOST ALL OF ITS INHABITANTS, HEREBY CONDEMN YOU TO IMMORTALITY, UNCONDITIONAL AND EVERLASTING. YOU WILL AGE, YOU WILL HUNGER, YOU WILL THIRST, AND _YOU WILL LIVE_. EVEN AS THE PLANET DIES AND THE STAR DISSIPATES, YOU WILL REMAIN. _YOU AND YOU ALONE.”_

Dialga and Palkia had begun to glow, and I felt a little shudder in my heart as they, and Xerneas, encased me in a too-bright rainbow light. Serena continued to scream in that terrible, multi-layered voice, and I realised the more the light flowing into me, the paler Serena/Xerneas became, until they were almost transparent. Literally fading from existence.

_Our final act._

“You do not believe us now,” they finally whispered, barely visible now, “but give it a few hundred million years as generations spring and wilt around you, as the mountains themselves are eroded to dust, as the sun expands and consumes your beautiful world, there will be nothing. You will be nothing.”

With a sound like a sigh, Xerneas’ legs began to disappear, then the torso and Serena’s human arms.

When all that remained was a head and horns, Serena/Xerneas eyes’ glowed with pure white light. They opened their mouth.

_“AS YOU DESERVE.”_

Immediately my stomach seemed to drop as we plummeted. In what seemed like seconds, we were standing over Sycamore’s body, where it had fallen from my grip on the lab floor. I looked at myself: human features.

As I bent to pick up the body, there was a flash of light at the window. I turned, and there sat Xerneas in the form of my final wish.

The Augustine at the window opened his mouth, his image shuddering as Xerneas struggled to hold to life, and said:

“We will not meet again.”

**Author's Note:**

> A/N:
> 
> I have a lot of one-shot fanfics sitting around that I wrote after finishing games or series, and this is one of them. I think I wrote this a few months ago, and gave it a quick look before posting, so hopefully no glaring errors. 
> 
> Also "Pilot" is the name of my starter (Fennekin, whoo!) after a pilot light, so I thought I would just use it >.>


End file.
